Our friends Taryn and Pedey from Speedhunters just posted Secrets Of The Japanese Car Scene…so I’m going to borrow some words from their introduction “Japan can seem like a magical, make-believe dream world, filled with all the automotive gems and treasures that your wildest dreams might conjure up for you if you’re lucky. Dreams filled with…scenes out of the Tokyo Drift and Wangan Midnight movies. Well, I’m here to tell you that’s exactly what Japan’s car culture is like. If you know where in Japan to find it, that is…” To contrast their exclusive insider view, my post will cover some of the more accessible aspects of this Automotive Heaven!

WARNING…100+ photos, but but split into 4 chapters…so don’t forget to slow down for some sporadic words and click the link at the bottom for the continued post! 😉

And the final chapter of our travel diaries…we didn’t originally plan for this but since we had some time to spare, we did some extensive research (links at the bottom of the page!) and made the long journey to the Prince & Skyline Museum in Okaya. After 2.5 hours on a train from Tokyo to Okaya, we took a ¥1500 taxi ride from Okaya Station to Toriihira Echo Park (we thought that our driver was just abandoning us, but yes…the museum is at the top of the hill inside the park). So the official museum website is in Japanese, so we used Google Translate to get the following address “〒 394-0055, Okaya, Nagano Prefecture character Uchiyama 4769-14 Toriihira Echo Park” and the taxi driver knew exactly where to take us). Unfortunately there were no taxis readily available to take us back to Okaya Station, so we just walked about 30 minutes down the hill with the help of Google Maps. Enough with the words…enjoy!

The museum’s exhibit starts upstairs with a very comprehensive Skyline toy collection!

Hi I'm Anthony Nguyen...originally from California and previously in Hawaii, currently in Portlandia with my 1973 BMW 2002. New location...new adventures - this is how it looks through my eyes . Fast Car Magazine . anthony[@]fatlace.com